More Clay digging and a Friendly Fox

Felicia* came to visit again today. She's getting friendlier but she will still run off if you move too fast or make a noise. We've seen one of her cubs and we think we now know where she's made her den. I guess she was wondering if I was digging up some tasty treats for her.

On the subject of digging... I managed to get a second of the clay beds dug over and planted another lot of Sweetcorn and Cape Gooseberries in there.

Meanwhile The Wife planted out 4 of the 8 Honey Bear Squashes...

As well as weeding and raking over all the remaining beds ready for the tomatoes and other stuff to be planted.

And finally we planted the first of the three troughs with cascading Petunias. Hopefully these will start fully flowering in the next month or so, to produce a nice front piece to the plot.

But finally the sunshine defeated us. Another Sunny Bank Holiday! What is going on in the world? This just isn't cricket, old bean.

Time to pick some Pak Choi for dinner, and an armful of rhubarb for yet more Rhubarb and Ginger Jam.

* As named by Belinda.

Digging clay

It's time to put out the sweetcorn.

The problem is that they are going into the new addition to the plot which was last seen under water. Also we're on London clay, so it's seriously tough going.

However I did manage to slog my way through it. So now we have a bed of Sweetcorn, interplanted with Cape Gooseberries.

Meanwhile the courgettes are looking really sorry for themselves after the bumper slug party that went on the other day.

Looks like we've completely lost three of the plants. We only have two spares sitting n the greenhouse. Ah well, after last year's crop I think we can do without for a bit.

But on the plus side, our first Strawberry of the season has started ripening.

 I think The Wife's Strawberry Empire is about to kick off. Hmm, must mean it's soon time for Wimbledon. Tennis anyone?

Slug Party

So when I visited the plot this evening I found that our newly planted courgettes were hosting a slug party.

I think we need some more courgette plants. (And less slugs)

No room. No room.

"The table was a large one, but the three were all crowded together at one corner of it: `No room! No room!' they cried out when they saw Alice coming."

Yeah, I feel like that now. The Greenhouses are packed to the gunnels with stuff and there doesn't seem to be any room left.

Fortunately I can make a little more room by planting out the courgettes into the new mound.

Now the next lot to go out will have to be the sweetcorns, but the spot for them is currently hard packed clay. It will take some serious work to get those beds ready, but I suspect that will be a job for next week.

But now with most things out and growing, the plot is beginning to look quite productive.

The trough, in the clay packed sweetcorn bed, will be planted with cascading petunias, once they've grown on a bit. As will the other two troughs that are in the middle of the plot.

But at least we have dinner...

...and dessert..

Actually, I'm really surprised by the Pak Choi this year. In previous years it's not done very well and either failed to mature or bolted straight away. This year it seems to have made a pleasant change. I even said to The Wife earlier in the year that this is the last of the seed and the last chance for it. Well it seems we've finally hit on the proper growing method for it.

Working Party

There are times when work on the actual plot has to be put on hold for the work on the site for the good of the community. Today we were working on fixing up one of the central pathways across the site. It took a couple of hours to get through it but with everybody helping we soon managed to clear out the old carpet and weeds and laid down a nice thick pathway of woodchips.

Once we managed to fight our way through, we ended up with a pretty decent path.

The Workers then stopped for tea (and brownies courtesy of Sue) and posed for photos.

The workers (left to right): Hiroe (aka The Wife), Pippa, Greg, Brian, Julie, Jasper, Simon, Michelle, Abby with Yours Truly taking the photo.

The whole thing probably took a shade under three hours (including tea and snacks). It's one of the benefits of everybody pulling together. Many hand make light work as the saying goes.


Once we all disbanded then we could face some work on our own plots. For my part I planted out Beetroot and Purple Carrots, into what we're calling the Purple Bed. The Wife potted on some of her beloved Cape Gooseberries. After that it started spitting with rain, so while we packed up and sheltered in the greenhouse we had a visit from the local Vixen.

We've been told that she has two cubs but we've yet to see them. Unfortunately it seems like we've lost Ben as we haven't seen him for a few months now. Now we have to choose a name for this little lass.

Back to the plot tomorrow as I have Shop Duty, and there is still much to do.

More potting on

Today it was the turn of the sweetcorn.

We're growing two varieties of sweetcorn. The first is our traditional variety that we've grown for the past 2 years. Not sure what it's called but we have yet to actually taste it as sweetcorn cobs directly. We've never been able to judge when it's ripe and ready and have always missed it at it's peak.

But that hasn't stopped us enjoying it. The kernels are full and round and don't shrivel up even when "dry". So the big benefit of this is that they can still be used as pop corn, and there they cannot be beaten. We just knock a small handful off the cob and drop them in the popcorn machine and mere seconds later we have nice full fluffy popcorn. A little goes a long way.

When we plant them, we pretty much get about a 99% germination rate. A little goes a long way.

The second variety is supposedly a full organic variety with big full cobs. However the actual little kernels are extremely shrivelled up and we're only getting about a 10% germination rate on them. So we're going to see how these fare. We may just use these as traditional corn cobs. But we're definitely keeping the popcorn variety long term now. I still have to try grinding the corn into flour and seeing if I can make corn bread.

Now I have a concern. The potatoes are poking their shoots up and seem to be off to a decent start. These are Maris Peers that I planted just a couple of weeks back. But now a couple of the plants are showing some brown spots on them (top).

Only two plants are showing this. The rest are the normal healthy green (bottom). Could this be the dreaded blight so early in the season. What do you think?

Ah well. More to do tomorrow.

Bank Holiday weekend

It's a Bank Holiday weekend here in the UK. And by tradition that means, rain, grey skies and dreary weather. Well it seems the weather didn't get the memo because today was a scorcher and tomorrow and Monday are set for even hotter.

The first Saturday in May is the World Naked Gardening Day (NSFW link). Well thats not happening at the allotment because when we arrived the place was packed. Seems the good weather has brought everybody out of hiding for the long weekend and there was a lot of activity there today.

No exception on our plot. The plants are beginning to take over the greenhouse (again) which means that we have to start potting on some of the seedlings. First on the list is the stupidly large amount of Ailsa Craig Tomatoes.

(This isn't all of them)

They're only dinky little things at present but the seed tray they were in was getting rather crowded. Talking of crowded, the Edamame (Soya Beans) have done well and are getting crowded in their toilet tubes.

So they're getting planted in an outside bed.

The Wife has also been potting on her Cape Gooseberries.

It seems we have an almost never ending supply of those.

Now here's an oddity of previous potting on. A couple of weeks ago, I potted on some Pak Choi. Now these are from the same seed tray, planted in the same compost and watered equally. The only difference being that one tray was placed closer to the greenhouse windows than the other. Look at the difference between them.

Any thoughts on why that should occur?

Anyway, it's given us a little more space in the main greenhouse. But not by much.

Tomorrow I'll be potting on all the sweet corns that we have. But for tonight we're going to beat a hasty retreat before we fry. Tomorrow we'll be at the plot at "what on earth time do you call that" (ie. about 6am) ready to get a load of work done before the heat kicks in. Then I have to go shopping for Ginger because we got the first rhubarb of the season.

Rhubarb and Ginger Jam time again. Allotmenteering is fun.